conjunction with writings of established reputation. Indeed, whatever hopes he bas, that the prefent work may be favourably received, arife chiefly from the confideration, that he has been affifted in it by gentlemen of the most diftinguished abilities; and that feveral, both of the old and the new Fables, are not written by himself, but by authors with whom it is an honour to be connected; and who having condefcended to favour bim with their affiftance, have given him an opportunity of making fome atonement for bis own defects. The life of Elop prefixed to the former editions of thefe fables, having been thought not fo full and fatisfactory as it might have been, a learned and ingenious friend has been fo kind as to confult the ancient writers who have made any men tion of Efop. He hopes he has added many facts and anecdotes of his life not hitherto taken notice of: and that he has fet his character in a clearer and better light, than it has hitherto appeared. The author has nothing further to add to this preface, than his thanks to the public for their candid reception of the work; and to acquaint his readers that as their favour has enabled him in a few months to print a third edition of it, he bas laid hold of the opportunity, and endeavoured by the affiftance of his friends, and by his own repeated applications, to render it lefs unworthy of that indulgence with which it has been honoured, A NEW LIFE of ESO P. N recording the lives of fuch perfons, as have made themfelves remarkable only by their writings, and who flou. rifhed at a very wide distance from our own times; the great difficulty, in general, is to collect fufficient memorials: but in giving an account of Efop, there arifes a particular difficulty, from the many falfhoods, which have been fo long and fo confidently afferted concerning him. I fhall therefore firft endeavour to clear the ground from thefe; and then to collect from writers of good credit, what may be related of him with more probability. The great diftorter both of Efop's life and perfon, is one Planudes; an eaftern monk, who lived at Conftantinople, toward the end of the 14th century. He publifhed feveral fables in Greek, under the Fabricius fays he flourished in the year isso.. Bibl. Græca, Lib. 3. cap. 28. p. 693. |